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Baidu set to raise US$3.1 billion in Hong Kong secondary listing at HK$252 per share
- Chinese artificial intelligence and search engine giant prices Hong Kong secondary listing at HK$252, below the maximum price sought, company says
- Baidu is the second US-listed Chinese tech firm to list in Hong Kong this year after Autohome
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Chinese search engine and artificial intelligence giant Baidu is set to raise US$3.08 billion (HK$23.9 billion) after pricing its Hong Kong secondary listing at HK$252 per share, the company said.
The offer price represents a 3 per cent discount to its Nasdaq closing price of US$266.78 on Tuesday. Baidu had originally sought to sell each share at up to HK$295, which would work out to US$304 if converted into an American depositary receipt (ADR). Its Nasdaq ADR has traded below that level since February 24. The pricing was reported earlier by Reuters and IFR.
Baidu’s pricing comes amid more lukewarm investors sentiment compared with when short-video platform Kuaishou’s Hong Kong retail tranche priced at the top-end of the marketed range. Tencent-backed Kuaishou’s bumper IPO raised over US$6 billion, the city’s biggest deal since Alibaba’s US$13 billion IPO in November 2019.
A Baidu spokeswoman declined to comment on pricing, saying that an announcement is pending.
Earlier this month, a share sale by Nasdaq-listed Chinese online car-selling platform, Autohome, raised US$688 million, about one-third short of its maximum offer target.
The Hang Seng has dropped 7 per cent from its 32-month high of 31,084 hit on February 17. Waning investor appetite could pose a challenge to other US-listed Chinese tech companies poised to launch deals this month, which include video-streaming platform Bilibili.
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